Support payments needed urgently

Support payments for businesses impacted by the latest COVID lockdown need to be processed immediately, according to Member for Narracan Gary Blackwood.

Visiting Cannibal Creek Bakehouse in Garfield last week, Mr Blackwood met with business owners David Rushton and Kane Warenycia to hear about the devastating impact of being classified as a metropolitan business.

Mr Rushton and Mr Warenycia said the community felt isolated and forgotten at a time when they needed government support the most.

They fear future outbreaks may result in the same lockdown.

“We need to look after and care about people and small business, help and show them the way forward. Not crush and smother them with rules and fines and never-ending restrictions on trade,” Mr Rushton said.

“There is also the stress caused by the thoughts of will we go into lockdown again? How can we keep our staff employed? How can we pay bills? How can we continue in uncertain times and how do we trust in a Victorian Government that isn’t looking after us?

“We are here to serve and look after our customers, our staff and our community. We need customers to be able to survive and to be a functioning business,” Mr Warenycia said.

“We need clarity about the financial support that we were told was coming to support us. Where is it?”

Mr Blackwood said the bakery was one of many Cardinia Shire businesses who had suffered because of their exclusion from the regional zone.

He said harsh lockdown settings, including travel limits, had severely impacted these businesses yet there had not been a positive case in the region for months.

“Here we have our rural and regional towns of Cardinia, being locked in with Melbourne, desperately in need of help yet still they are left waiting for their financial support they were promised by the Victorian Government,” he said.

Mr Blackwood said there was no clarity on whether they would be eligible for funding or when the assistance would be paid.

“It’s simply not right and these payments must begin flowing immediately to support the local businesses,” Mr Blackwood said.

Member for Eastern Victoria Melina Bath recently called for the state government to release its health advice for locking down regional businesses.

Ms Bath said Small Business Minister Jaala Pulford had refused to release the health advice that the government used as its basis for closing Gippsland small businesses.

Ms Bath said Gippsland small business owners wanted to trade and many small businesses had suffered financial stress.

“If regional Victorians continue to be plunged into lockdowns, the danger is these once thriving businesses will become unsustainable as customers lose motivation and withdraw their patronage.

“With zero cases in regional Victoria, Labor must remove the shackles and allow country people and small businesses return to the same operating conditions prior to lockdown four,” Ms Bath said.